


California dreamin’ on such a winter’s day

by Catharrington



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Billy Hargrove Has a Crush on Steve Harrington, Idiots in Love, Injury Recovery, Love Confessions, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post Season 3, Valentine’s Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-17 21:40:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29478582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catharrington/pseuds/Catharrington
Summary: Billy scrambles to throw one of his bed’s quilts over the huge pile of Valentine’s gifts before dragging the door of his closet closed. Stripping off his coat and boots to make it seem like he’s been home all day, he readies himself with a few greedy breaths before he opens the door.“Hey,” Steve nods, smile on his face.“Hey,” Billy says back breathlessly.Steve pulls out a connivence store bag filled with beer and chips. Billy drags him inside the apartment by the collar of his preppy sweater.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 5
Kudos: 114
Collections: Harringrove Heart-On (2021)





	California dreamin’ on such a winter’s day

**Author's Note:**

> For the Harringrove Heart-on. Prompts used: dozen roses, box of chocolate, stuffed animals, Cupid, red ribbons.

July that year wasn’t kind to Billy Hargrove. Most of the months following it, were equally as unkind to the kid. 

Inside the hospital, wires connected him to tubes that kept him living. Pumps pushing in and out, and in and out, keeping his deflated lungs working inside his ripped up body. 

His tanned skin was marked up with pearly white scars. New skin that grew back where the old was dead. 

Below the tattoo of a skull he had gotten inked on his upper bicep was a long gash that filled in more shallow than the rest of his skin. He would run a thumb over it, sometimes, as he laid down in his bed and thought about how his skin would never be the same. 

How his body would never be the same. How he’s got so damn many scars on his body from other people. Other things— that always thought they were stronger than him. 

When Max would come and visit, clutching tightly around her small shoulders a too big denim jacket, Susan hanging off her back like a worried witch. Thin fingers that used to cover her mouth when she watched, now clutch the strap of her purse timidly. She stands behind Max with a thin line pursed from her lips. And Max’s lopsided grin is much more brighter, but not less real. 

And Billy gets reminded each time he sees them that he did survive. 

That maybe the scars were a testimony to his strength. And not a weakness. 

When the other kids file in like clowns coming out of a damn clown car, show up happy to see him. Spewing shit about how he saved their lives. How he saved their best friend, even if really she was the one who did most of the saving. Billy changes his thinking, thinks maybe he’s happy he lived. 

One day, still inside the hospital, but the walls decorated with maple leaves and turkeys. Billy’s reminding his body how to stand up. How to walk on bones that were broken and steady his breath with lungs that were stitched back together. 

The girl who saved his life runs into his chest with a hug. Her wild curls flat against the thickest part of his scars on his chest. 

Billy holds his tears in his eyes. Screws up his top lip. Turns with a grimace on his face away from her, only to spot Steve Harrington off in the corner of the room. A shitty little smile on his pretty boy face. 

And Billy thinks he’s happy he lived. 

Happy in the way, he doesn’t think he hates Steve Harrington anymore. Thinks maybe he could have overreacted a little last year when he found Max hiding out at the Byers’ house. How he could have misread Harrington being there as a creep, when really he was being a protector. A babysitter.  
Billy should honestly be thankful in the way Steve came out to talk to him in the drive way, that night Billy came roaring up demanding answers, with just his pretty face— and not his bat filled with nails. 

Now, Steve’s got his thin fingers wrapped around the butt of a cigarette. Not in a fist, and not around the end of a bat. His face is blurry and absent looking in the cloud of white smoke around it. They are sitting on the edge of Billy’s open window at his temporary home. Waiting for the clock to tick down to the New Year. 

It’s a tiny apartment right next to Hawkins’ tiny hospital. The doctors and Steve call it what it is: a physical rehab facility until he’s cleared to go it alone again. Billy calls it for what it feels like: a half-way house. 

The TV is on the back ground with an announcer talking about the ball drop in New York. Neither boy is really listening. Billy’s got his eyes trained on Steve. His hair longer from the months that have passed. His shallow cheeks sunken in like he hasn’t been eating. This cigarette they are passing between them isn’t good for either of their health. But still, Billy takes it as Steve offers. 

The sky has snow flurries that melt before they reach the cement below them. Steve’s hair moves with them. A couple flakes land on the dark chocolate strands. 

Billy’s own head got shaved. His ears that poke out are cold in the night. But he doesn’t turn back inside for anything. 

Not even when the TV screams a ten second count down for the New Year. And in the distance they can hear the explosion of fireworks. Billy sucks in a long drag. 

When he passes the thin, white cigarette back to Steve their fingers brush. Steve’s face is still stoic, and cold. But when he puts the filter between his lips, Billy can’t help but think about how that’s his first New Year’s kiss. 

“We should make a New Year resolution to stop smoking,” Steve mutters. His face pointing out the window still. His lips bobbing the orange tip of the smoke. 

“Shit,” Billy laughs, his voice gravel and deep sounding ever since July. Like his voice got scarred along with everything else. “I’m sure all the docs would love that. And Hop, and Joyce,” he chooses to trail off with another chuckle before he simply lists everyone. 

“And me.” Steve says it so shortly. Just as quick as he holds out the cigarette for Billy to take back. 

It’s at the very last drag. Lots of black ash falling from it’s tip to tumble down into the parking lot below. Billy takes it with a smile. Steve brushes his fingers again as he finally cracks his own pretty grin. 

“I’ll do it with you then,” Billy replies. Taking a mouthful before flicking the filter away. Into the flurrying snowfall. 

He wanted to say ‘I’ll do it for you, Steve Harrington’. Because he knows he doesn’t hate Steve Harrington anymore. He thinks he might kinda really like him. 

Started liking him back when he drove Max and all her friends to the out of town hospital just to stand in the corner and wait. 

Started liking him when Steve brought a thick cotton sweater that smelt like dryer sheets and cologne. It read ‘Hawkins basketball state championship’ for a year he didn’t even attend the school yet. Muttering something under his breath about ‘hospitals always being too cold’, while he watched Billy pull it over his head. 

Started liking him when he held onto the handles of the wheelchair while Billy was learning how to walk between two, cold metal bars. Started loving him the first day Billy managed to not fall down to his knees cursing, but made it to the end of those never ending bars. And Billy screwed his face in a grimace up and away from the Nurse’s praise, only to land on Steve’s bright white smile. 

Started liking him when Billy got moved to a bare-bones, spooky ass, half-way house where instead of any insults or fake comments, Steve showed up with an armful of folded quilts and a six pack of beer precariously perched on top. Whistled as he came in the door. Said, ‘well it’s a step up from your last bachelor pad. Vintage, pretty sick.’ 

Billy socked him in the arm. Steve hit him back, just as hard, even with his body a Frankenstein patch work of scars and new parts. 

They drank all that beer sitting on the floor in front of the TV. Billy let it slip he was sorry for everything he did. And Steve put his hand on the back of his neck, those long fingers petting across the peach fuzz of his regrowing hair. 

“I think you’ve apologized enough, Bill,” Steve had whispered so, so gently, “I think you’ve proven enough.” 

And when Billy went to sleep that night it was with his nose pressed into a quilt that smelt like dryer sheets and cologne. 

Realized he liked that warm smell more than anything. 

It was freezing cold all through January. Snow actually stuck to Max’s boots as she kicked in the door. Spread out a collection of red and pink on his hand me down kitchen table she insisted she was working on. 

“Valentines,” she explained with a roll of her eyes. 

“I know the fuckin’ holiday, Maxine. But who the hell are you giving this to?” He grumbled over her shoulder. 

She rolled her eyes, kicking her long hair over her shoulder when she did it, as if Billy made her whole body twitch with annoyance. “For giving out at class. I have to address each of these to the party and mom was NO help. She tried to get me to use glitter gel pens!” 

As Max lined up each valentine across the table, counting them out and putting them in a straight bingo card sort of line, her nails clicked across the wood varnish. 

Billy silently watched her. Read each one of the horrible red and pink slips of overpriced paper as they came into the line. Store bought, worse than the next, but somehow. It made his heart pitter-patter in his chest. His refurbished lungs struggling to keep pace with its rapid beating. 

“Yeah,” he finally broke the spell by turning around. Forcing himself to casually stomp off into the kitchen. One of his huge hands pushing nervously through his shaggy regrown hair. To try and ground himself. Try and remember that wasn’t his style, to have a heart that pitter-pattered. 

“Glitter,” he growled out. Taking a beer out the fridge he wasn’t supposed to have in stock at all and cracking it open with a metallic hiss. When he drank it, he thought about how Steve left it behind with a knowing grin. 

“Don’t want to come on too strong,” Billy jokes through a gulp of beer, “those little nerds might cream just from that.” 

“Ugh!” Max made a fake gag noise. Her cheeks turning bright red as she spins in her chair to hiss at him. “Don’t make me hurl chunks!” 

Then she turned back to the table with a completely normal marker, her tongue caught between her teeth, and worked on her Valentines. 

Billy held the rim of his beer can up to his lips as he watched her. Thinking, idly pushing the metal side to side on his plush lower lip, about how much all that cost her. 

And he considered it’s just paper. Shouldn’t be too much. And it’s not like his bank account is thin after almost dying at the sharp tentacle end of a huge government conspiracy theory. The feds in their creepy black suits were all to happy to give his bank account lots of zeros, that is, as long as he kept his mouth shut. 

So it’s not like he couldn’t afford a card with cartoon pink hearts on it. Or a velvet covered box of chocolates. Or even a teddy bear with a big ribbon tied around it’s neck. 

Billy drank his beer all in one go, crushing the empty can with his fist. 

Then the next day, he walked hands in his pockets to Melveld’s general store. Denim jacket pulled over his hoodie that he pulled up to cover his big ears. To cover the scar on the side of his head where they cut him open to look at his brain still showed a tad through his shaggy, short hair. 

If Joyce still had been working here she would have yelled at him. Told him that’s not nearly thick enough of a jacket for the long Indiana winter months. There’s snow in the forecast for Valentine’s Day, after all. Maybe he could fit into one of Jonathan’s old hand me down jackets, she would think out loud, and Billy would scoff before showing off his sharp canine teeth. Tell her he’s still got California heat stored way, deep down. And no winter, weather, or monster could rip that out of him. 

He’s honestly happy she isn’t here, though. As he wanders up and down the holiday aisles. His scarred fingers hovering over item after item as he considers what to pick. 

Maybe just food, Steve wouldn’t turn that down. Or maybe something he can keep and cuddle, the guy comes off pretty touchy-feely. Yet, maybe just a simple card with enough space left open for Billy to write down his own words could be the best. 

He picks one up and flips it left and right. Glitter that covered the whole front flaked off in waves over his hands. Some caught on the scars left on his palms. Laying over the curves to fit right into the slashes and stitches marks. 

He folds the card and sets it back on the shelf.  
Walks a little farther down until he sees a bag of flower petals, wrapped up in neatly glued plastic and a ribbon. All different colors, pink and red and white. Billy picked one pouch up, squished it with his hand. Felt the way they folded, but didn’t bruise. Turning his palm up, he slowly uncurled his fingers. The plastic crinkling in slow motion as it reformed to its shape. 

Sure, Billy was happy that Joyce wasn’t working there anymore. Especially because it would have been a lot more fucking complicated to explain why he bought one bag of petals in every color, along with a whole damn arm load of other toys and trinkets, than explaining why he didn’t want Jonathan Byers’ ugly hand me down coat. 

Dragging bags and bags up the steps to his cozy half-way house apartment, Billy struggles to balance it all while he unlocked the door. Almost dropping one bag, a teddy bear’s head dangerously luling out the top. 

Of course, he somehow manages with a grit of his teeth. Slamming the door closed with his boot before stomping into his room. He let the bags drop on the floor of his closet. Stacked as best he could into a neat pile. Looking down at it, at the way that bear keeps looking back at him, he’s thinking maybe he bought too much. 

But he’s got no time, as the door he just closed rattles to life with a knock. A series of musical taps that let him know exactly who it is without even having to ask. Steve’s knuckles sound just as pretty as he is. 

Billy scrambles to throw one of his bed’s blankets over the pile before dragging the door of his closet closed. Stripping off his coat and boots to make it seem like he’s been home all day, he readies himself with a few greedy breaths before he opens the door. 

“Hey,” Steve nods, smile on his face. 

“Hey,” Billy says back breathlessly. 

Steve pulls out a connivence store bag filled with beer and chips. Billy drags him inside the apartment by the collar of his preppy sweater.

Somehow, it ends up with them squished between the coffee table and the couch, sitting on the floor. Steve throwing his neck backwards in a wild laughter about something on the TV. His throat works through the laugh, showing off all his muscles, his veins, as they strain under his creamy skin. 

Billy watches, even as his mouth drys out and he’s forced to take another swig of his beer. Billy watches as Steve lives right in front of him. His face folding into wrinkles around his eyes that one day will stick. His eye that used to be swollen shut with a bruise. His clock ticking even as he laughs away. 

The beer falls from Billy’s hands with a quiet whoosh. He didn’t know when he stopped feeling his hands. How he lost grip of the drink. 

All he could do was passively feel as the cold liquid dribbled all around his legs to soak into his pants. His lazy lounger pants, light heather gray, and now transparent with the wetness crawling up and up his thighs. 

“Oh shit, Billy,” Steve notices, his voice a mix of concern and panic. The sweet laugh thrown out for wide eyes. 

Scrambling hands find Billy’s legs, pressing the throw blanket always hanging on the back of the couch to them like a good excuse for a towel. 

Billy can’t keep up, can’t decide where he wants his eyes to focus on. Those hands so close, so warm against the cold of the beer on his legs. Or if he wants to get lost in the way Steve’s big, brown eyes blink. 

He’s close enough to kiss. Close enough to see that even in such a dingy ass half-way house, his crappy speckled dry walls matching it’s ancient yellowed lights, Steve’s eyes are still as sparkly as the night sky over the ocean. All lit up with nothing but stars. 

Billy can vaguely hear Steve’s mouth making noises. He reaches out towards the words just as they start making sense. 

“—Hear me?,” Steve’s asking, all the way worried now. “Is it your hands or is something happening? Can you tell me, Bill?” And he just keeps talking like that’s going to, y’know, break the spell he’s got over Billy’s heart instead of solidifying it. 

Billy allows his hand to be grabbed out of the air. Let’s Steve’s pretty, perfect fingers, pull his patchwork palm into a grasp. Feels as Steve draws a circle with his thumb into the thickest patch of Billy’s scars. 

It feels like they’re dancing together. That Steve’s got his pretty boy hands all over him, leading him right where he wants to go. And he knows all the steps so he doesn’t even have to look down. Just keeps those brown eyes trained to Billy’s blue ones without any fucking apology for it. 

Billy releases all he’s got with a hiccup, a gasping noise that claws from his throat. Feels everything he’s been realizing he’s feeling scratch at his throat with monster-like sharp nails. 

He sucks in a dark, harsh breath. Swallowing down another hiccup. Turns his head so he’s not looking with cartoon heart eyes at Steve Harrington anymore. 

“Ain’t my fuckin’ hands,” he growls. Scooting backwards on the floor, only getting a couple inches until he’s got his back to the couch. 

Steve’s hands stay hovering where Billy’s legs were, now over his ankles. He tights his grip on the throw blanket until his knuckles are white. 

“Is this... an episode, or some shit?” Steve asks.

Billy scoffs at him, at his worry, at his pretty face that’s even pretty when wrinkled up at the brow. “I just. I’m—,” Billy’s throat worked on the words but his chest couldn’t get them out. It felt too tight. To much new skin over his scars that hasn’t been stretched out. 

“I gotta go piss, Steve. And change these damn pants,” he rushes it all out. In one breath. Gripping the cushions of the couch and lifting himself up to jog into the bathroom. 

He closes the door behind him. Locks it just for good measure, kicks himself in the ass for it because he knows that Steve isn’t like that. He’s slow, and gentle. And he wouldn’t barge into a room like a doctor or a nurse with all their tests or needles. Steve never would. 

But Billy’s spent a long time not being able to control the locks on his door. It’s a bad habit, just like smoking and drinking. Something he’s got to work out. 

Gently, he can hear shuffling in the living room. Feet trudging through the carpet. Crinkling of things being cleaned up when it’s not even his responsibility. 

Then the feet falls come to the door. And stop.  
Billy can hear a gentle tapping. And he knows, he knows, it’s Steve’s fingertips against the cheep partial board of the door. Pressing ever so softly.

“Okay,” Steve exhales. “It’s late, isn’t it.” Not a question. “I’m gonna head back home, man. Sorry to sound like a worry wart but. But you’re okay in there, right?”

Billy chokes out a horrible sounding laughter. It just bubbles up, he hates it but that’s how his laugher is he guesses. “Goodnight, Mom,” he cackles. 

More tapping. More fingertips against the door. “Call me tomorrow, right, Bill?”

Billy’s standing in the middle of the bathroom. His hands make two fists on either side of his thighs. And even though it hurts him, hurts his whole chest, he lets some of the words he’s been wanting to say since July come out his throat. 

“Goodnight, Steve,” he repeats. Softly, quiet, like a raindrop against the petal of a flower, rolling down the velvet side and trying not to disturb anything as it rolls. 

Steve replies with a whispered, “night, then,” before he walks out. The door to the apartment shutting behind him not escaping the distance of the bathroom door. 

Billy shifts his bones. They feel all melted together from standing in one place for so long. He rounds on his heals and faces the sink. Looks at his reflection with something he’s not completely used to. Not disdain, not pity, not an inflated ego. He looks at himself with determination. With pursed lips and a flick to his brow that he recognizes as one thing he actually liked about himself before July. 

He grips the side of his tiny sink. Leans forward. And thinks about how Steve wanted to touch him. Wanted to reach out and hold his hand, stroke his scars until they felt again like real skin. 

Billy leaned closer to the glass. He opened his mouth. Took a breath. And said, “I love you, Steve Harrington.” 

It hurt like coughing up glass. Like falling off his surf board and taking in a whole lungful of salt water. 

But Billy steadied his stance. Gripped the sink until it was shaking. 

“I love you, Steve Harrington.” He climbed back on his surf board and tried again. And again. And again. Until it felt good under his skin. Until the words were gentle to the touch. Gentle like Steve’s touch. 

Like hell, he was going to try and make himself something that was worth Steve reaching out. Those fingers petting across his skin, his regrowing hair, all of it. He wanted to be worth it for Steve. Worth living for. 

“I love you, Steve Harrington,” he smiled. 

Valentine’s Day crept up on him. It was as much scary waiting for it as exciting. Like a rush of a joint’s smoke blown from one set of lips to the other. 

He stood outside his shitty little not half-way house apartment with a smirk and a cigarette on his lips. 

“This is creepy,” Max was looking up at him. Her cardboard box gripped under her arm ready for her morning classes. “You’re acting really creepy.”

Billy looked down at her. Quirked a brow. “I’m happy. Is that creepy?” 

“Yes,” Max exasperated, “yes, it totally is!” 

Flicking the half finished smoke into the parking spaces, he motioned his hand away. “Why are you even here? Go away!” 

Across the parking lot, a dark red BMW swung into a spot close to them. Even with the chill of February flaring through the air, Steve had his window rolled down. One arm poking out so he can lean casually, romantically out to greet them. 

“Morning, trouble-makers,” he sneers. 

Billy lifts his hand to give a little salute. Max just grumbles under her breath. Jogging toward the car so she can get in the back. Taking up the passenger seat, the annoying and hairy Chewbacca to Steve’s Han Solo, Dustin turns around to greet her. Lifting up his own decorated box for their Valentine collection day. 

Billy turns to leave, when Steve calls out to him.  
“Wait up, Bill,” he reaches one hand towards him. 

There’s so much space between them his hand doesn’t land on anything. Slaps against the metal instead. But still, Billy does turn to give Steve his attention. 

“After I drop these guys off, are you- are you busy?” He asks. 

“Well,” Billy starts, “I mean unless you know a babe that’s into sleeping with the undead, I’m all free!” 

Steve huffs out the side of his mouth. Making a pice of his hair lift up off his forehead. He’s such a bitch, such a prissy idiot, and Billy really can’t fight how it makes his heart swell up. “Yeah, so, that’s a yes. You’re free.”

“If you insist, dude,” Billy drawls out, feigning indifference. 

The two kids in the back seat make matching annoyed groans. Rushing Steve along with a kick to the back of his car seat. He rolls his eyes again, before rolling back up the window and throwing the car in reverse. Smartly choosing to listen instead of fight. 

If Billy were driving his old Camaro, Max would have lost a foot for that kick. 

But he isn’t, his not the same hair trigger asshole he was before. He’s got a scar over his chest and all new hair blowing in the frost bitten breeze. 

And now, Billy’s the kind of guy why buys his crush gifts to confess on Valentine’s Day. Now, Billy’s got a limited amount of time and a shit ton to get done. He stands in the lot just long enough for Steve’s car to disappear before he books it back to the steps for his apartment. 

Rips the door open to his closet to pull back the blanket he’s kept over the bags. That teddy bear shifts with the motion, tumbling out the plastic bag to land at Billy’s socked feet. He scoops the toy up with one hand. Bracing it under its squishy armpit. 

“Are you ready, little dude?” He asked. “You better not fuck this up for us, huh?” 

The bear, obviously, didn’t reply. Just watched him back with a set of glossy plastic eyes that were so big and brown they reminded him of Steve’s. 

Billy sucked his tongue across the bottom of his teeth. Then, sending a silent prayer upstairs, he tucked the bear under his arm and got to work. 

He started by hanging a gift bag off the door, a gaudy pink thing with glitter hearts drawn on the side. The first thing Steve will see when he comes up the steps. 

The second thing he did was yank open the flimsy plastic bag of a bunch of heart shaped chocolates, taking the whole lot and leaving them trailing into the living room. Making a sugar induced, purple and red wrapper covered path for Steve to follow. 

On the kitchen table he laid down a bouquet of roses. The elegance of the bright pink tissue wrapped bouquet stood out on the backdrop of his cheap table. Steve will see them for sure. Will grab them up against his chest and smell how fresh they are, even after being trapped in a closet for a couple days. Hopefully, they are still fresh. Billy sneaks a deep breath just to be sure. And damn, they are fresh enough. 

To make a second path leading from the kitchen, he rips open the packs of petals to form a trail to the bedroom. Sprinkling them around as best he can. Pastel pink to match the bouquet, then brilliant ivory colored ones, then the brightest firehouse red petals Billy’s ever seen. 

He leaves those for inside the bedroom. Leads them to the bed he actually made for once in his life. Let’s them flutter around it in a half circle so that Steve knows the bed is the center point. 

The bed is the question Billy’s asking, after all.

Right on top the sheets is that bear from before. Sitting so one of its chubby arms rest over the biggest box of chocolates he could find. And Billy didn’t skimp, he wanted everything to be perfect. Just like Steve. So the box has a brilliant black velvet top. A long red ribbon going the length of it. 

The bear has a matching ribbon on his neck. Billy picked him just for that. Just to really make an impression. 

Because he wants what’s best for Steve. He wants this Valentine’s Day to be the one that sticks in his memory. Floating around that pretty head of hair as the best damn, lame ass, love confession he's ever gotten. 

Billy turns to his closet and gets the last thing out. Something he didn’t buy from Melvelds. No, this was something he had in his closet long before July. Long before Hawkins, Indiana. It was a glossy black satin shirt that he bought at a second-hand shop back in California. 

It had short sleeves that hugged at the curves of his biceps. It had buttons made of mother of pearl that caught the light with a rainbow strobe. He never had a place to wear it. Never wanted to wear it anywhere his damn dad could have seen it. But, now he wasn’t with his damn dad. 

The only one seeing him was Steve Harrington. 

Billy left the top of his shirt unbuttoned. Left it open all the way down to his belly button. 

He turned on his heels to look at his reflection in the mirror on his closet door. And there, he found something looking back. 

All across his chest. The silver scars. One going down his shoulder to meet the one splitting him right down the little. He looked like a corpse after autopsy. But this corpse got up. Got stitched back up and given a second chance. 

He turned to the side where his tattoo showed halfway out his sleeve. The bottom of it had that same scar. That sunken in part of his skin that was taken away from him. 

Billy reached up and ran his finger over the skin. 

Sucked in a harsh breath. 

From outside his room he could hear his apartment door open and close. Could hear Steve take off his shoes and shrug off his coat. Could even hear the crinkling of that bag he gave him as Steve picks up the wrapped chocolates one by one. Plopping them into the bag. 

Then a crinkle of tissue paper. A loud one. As he lifts the bouquet from the table and presses it to his chest. 

Billy moves to stand right in the middle of his room. He’s watching towards the door with widened eyes. Watching where the petals disappear under the closed door. 

And Steve’s not the type to just barge in. He isn’t a cop, isn’t a nurse. He waits for a second at the wood before knocking softly. Tapping his knuckles in that same music he always does. Letting Billy know it’s him. That it’s safe because it’s just Steve. 

Billy opens his mouth. But nothing comes out. All his practice, washed out from shore just like a child’s first sandcastle. 

“Bill,” Steve calls out in a question. His voice shaky. 

Closing his eyes, sucking in a readying breath, he lumbers towards the door. Ripping it open with the same quickness his chest got ripped open. Like a bandaid off a wound. 

He stands in the doorway. Looking towards Steve’s blushing face. His eyes wide as a stuffed teddy bear, his cheeks flushed just as bright as the bouquet clutching to his chest. Billy feels shaky again. Knows he’s lost that feeling in his hands again. Takes a step backwards so he doesn’t simply fall into Steve Harrington’s fucking arms. 

“I can,” Billy stutters, “I can explain,” he grits his teeth. “It’s not— shit. I was just—,”

“What?” Steve’s smile breaks into a breathtaking smile. “Am I interrupting your date or something, man? I figured the name on the card meant this was for me?” And he plucks that damn card out from the bag Billy left on the door knob. Tilts his head to the side to show off the front of it. 

A cartoon Cupid with a little bow and arrow. Inside Billy had written some damn Bon Jovi lyrics, and Steve’s name right above them. Addressed to him. 

He thought it was funny, at the time, but now it felt so, so stupid. 

“This-this is dumb, Steve. Don’t look. Don’t even,” he chided himself. Turning around to snatch the bear off the bed. “I’m gonna burn it all!” 

And Billy’s not throwing the bear against the wall like how he wanted to. Not abusing it or hitting it the way his muscles before July knew best. His fingers wraps around the plush softness. Pulling it into his stomach so maybe the feeling of it’s fur will scare away some of the butterflies fluttering there. 

He doesn’t see Steve’s face. Doesn’t want to be the end of that joke. 

He doesn’t know until he feels those perfect fingers wrap around his biceps. 

He startles with it, the touch, how soft and gentle it is. How timid his hands are as they move across his muscles over to his chest. Those fucking fingers feeling across the fabric of his shirt. 

Until they touch skin. They feel over his scars there. Press just hard enough to be felt. Just hard enough, it feels like a kiss. 

“I don’t want to look away?” Steve whispers. 

His mouth is right behind Billy’s ear. He’s taller than him by an inch. Makes it so he feels every ounce of warm breath Steve gives him. 

Inside his chest. Under the touch of Steve’s fingers. Under his crisscrossing patch work of movie monster scars. Under his heaving rib cage. His heart steadied into a beat he could breath around. 

He stopped gasping for air inside his lungs. He stopped searching the many hospital release records for what fucking words he wanted to say. 

He got back up on his surf board. Lifted to his feet. And planted them. 

Billy tuned around in Steve’s arms. Spun so he was only an inch away from his lips. Steve’s hands stayed up so now they gripped at the back of Billy’s neck. They felt so good, so right. Everything falling into place. 

The bear drops between them with a soft thud. 

Billy’s hands feel up the side of Steve’s slim waist. Pulling him close enough to see how different those big brown eyes were from a teddy bear. How deep, and dark they were. While also sparkling with specks of honey colored glitter. 

“I love you, Steve Harrington,” he rode the wave. 

And Steve leaned forward, with a smile on his lips, and kissed him better.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Valentine’s Day!! 🖤🖤🖤


End file.
